The abandoned gas station looms out of the darkness as I approach, its broken windows like empty eye sockets staring into the night. Dragon is already here, his bike parked on the shoulder where Kayla’s car had been. He’s leaning against it, arms crossed over his chest, face grim.
“You made good time,” he says as I kill my engine. Those uncanny green-gold eyes assess me coolly.
“How did you know where she was taken?” I demand, not bothering with pleasantries.
Dragon’s mouth quirks up at one corner. “I know a lot of things,” he says, which isn’t an answer at all. “What matters is that I know where my brother is holding your wife.”
Hope flares, bright and dangerous. “Where?”
“Get on your bike,” Dragon says, already moving toward his own. “Follow me.”
“Why are you helping me?” I ask, not moving yet. “What’s in it for you?”
Dragon pauses, looking back at me over his shoulder. “Let’s just say I have my own reasons for wanting to find Kit.” His expression hardens slightly. “Are you coming or not?”
I don’t need to be asked twice. I kick my bike back to life and fall in behind him as he pulls out onto the road. We ride for what feels like an hour, the landscape growing increasingly remote. Pine forests press close on either side of the road, their shadows deep and impenetrable.
Eventually, Dragon signals and turns onto a dirt track so overgrown it’s barely visible from the main road. We have to slow to a crawl, navigating around fallen branches and deep ruts.
After what feels like an eternity of winding through dense forest, the trees suddenly give way to a clearing. Five weathered warehouses stand in a rough semicircle, their metal sides rusted, windows boarded up or broken. They look like they’ve been abandoned for years, forgotten by the world.
I park next to Dragon, killing my engine. The place is silent, our breathing the only sounds I can hear.
“Where are we?” I ask, voice hushed in the eerie stillness.
“Somewhere most people don’t know exists,” Dragon replies cryptically. “Somewhere Kit is very familiar with.”
He reaches into his cut, pulling out a handgun. I do the same.
“Stay alert,” Dragon murmurs as we approach the nearest warehouse. “Kit’s always been unpredictable. He’ll be even more so now.”
We approach the nearest warehouse cautiously. I expect to find the door locked, or at least difficult to open after what must be years of disuse. But it swings open easily at Dragon’s touch, the hinges surprisingly silent.
Inside, there’s nothing but dust and silence. Empty space where once there might have been machinery or storage. No sign of recent occupation. No sign of Kayla.
“This way,” Dragon says, already moving toward the door that leads to the next building.
We search the second warehouse with similar results. Empty. Abandoned. No trace that anyone has been here in years, let alone days. My heart sinks lower with each empty room, each dark corner that yields nothing.
The third warehouse is different. As soon as we step inside, I can tell. The dust on the floor is disturbed, footprints crisscrossing the concrete in chaotic patterns. Cigarette butts litter the ground near the far wall, some still fresh enough that I can smell the lingering tobacco.
“Someone was here,” I say, voice tight with renewed hope and fear.
Dragon nods, moving deeper into the space. “Recently too,” he says, bending to examine a discarded food wrapper. “I doubt they’ve been gone long.”
We search more thoroughly, finding evidence of a hasty departure. Forgotten items; a jacket, a half-empty pack of cigarettes, a cheap plastic lighter were left behind in what must have been a rapid evacuation. But there’s no sign of Kayla.
“Viper!” Dragon’s voice echoes from a small side room. “In here.”
I follow his voice, finding him standing in the doorway of what looks like a storage closet that’s been converted into a makeshift cell. A narrow cot with a thin mattress takes up most of the space. No windows. Just a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, currently dark.
And there, half-hidden under the cot, is a crumpled wad of fabric. My heart stops as Dragon bends to retrieve it, holding it up for me to see.
It’s a dress. Green or at least, it was once green, before it was torn and stained with dirt and who knows what else. It’s the same dress Kayla was wearing the night she disappeared. The same dress she wore in Demon’s video.
I take it from Dragon’s hands, the fabric soft and familiar between my fingers. Bringing it to my face, I inhale deeply, searching for any trace of Kayla’s scent.There’s just the faintest hint, her perfume, the one I bought her last Christmas. The one she was wearing for our date that never happened.
“She was here,” I say, my voice barely audible even to my own ears. The dress clutched in my hands feels both like proof of life and a death sentence. “They had her here.”